AncestryDNA alert

There are changes coming soon — possibly very very soon — to the matching system at AncestryDNA that may make some of the folks who’ve tested there lose some bits and pieces of information they have now.

This isn’t going to be altogether a bad thing, since the theory is that most of the things that will drop out of sight will be bits and pieces that are unlikely ever to lead to a common ancestor. In short, the hope is all of our matches will be better, stronger and more accurate.

But there are some aspects that will be problematic, and folks need to act now to minimize any collateral damage from the change.

Here’s what’s happening: AncestryDNA is revising its system for evaluating matches in two ways. First, it’s revising its phasing data to more accurately identify bits and pieces of DNA that are genealogically significant. Second, it’s changing its matching system to use actual segments from start to end rather than artificially designated windows.

What does that mean? In plain English, some of the people who are showing up as matches at AncestryDNA right now will stop showing up as matches. Not huge numbers (not like the last time AncestryDNA revised its system and some folks lost as many as 90% of their matches) — but some. At the same time, some people who now don’t show up as matches may appear in the match list. So in terms of sheer numbers of matches, there isn’t going to be any big change.

AncestryDNA says no-one who now appears as a second cousin or closer will drop off anyone’s match list. And it’s promised that we will be able to download data on anyone in the current match list where we’ve either added a note to that match’s record or added a star to the record for our own research.

But — and here’s a big but — many people who show up now as matches at one level will drop into a lower category of match level: for example, some people now showing as third cousins will drop into the fourth cousin category, and a very large number now showing at the fourth cousin level are going to drop into a lower match category — the fifth to distant cousin category.

This matters for two reasons: it’s going to impact shared match reporting and it’s likely to impact circles and new ancestor discoveries (NADs).

Shared matches is a real concern. Remember that feature works this way: for any match, on the review match page, there’s a button to see shared matches. But when you click on that button, to see anyone you and this match have as a common match, you only get a list of those who match you at the fourth cousin or closer level. Since a lot of our matches are going to stop being counted as fourth cousins and start being counted as fifth to distant cousins, we’re going to have a lot of shared matches that won’t show up in that list any more.

Circles and NADs are also potentially going to be affected, and the estimate is that most people will lose one circle and one NAD because of the changes in their matches.

Until the whole change is rolled out, of course, we won’t know the full impact, but there are some things we can all do right now to minimize any fallout from the changes.

So here’s the action plan:

1. Make a screen capture or other record of every DNA Circle you have, and make sure you make a note of every person who’s now in those circles.

2. Make a screen capture or other record of every NAD you have, and make sure you make a note of every person who’s now in those NADs.

3. Go to your DNA Matches list, click on the link for Shared Ancestor Hints and star every single one of those. Those are the folks with whom you share both DNA and a tree hint, and you don’t want to lose their data even if they fall off the bottom of your match list. If you star them now, you’ll be able to download the data down the road.

4. For those Shared Ancestor Hint folks, screen capture as many of the shared match lists as you want to preserve — remember that some people showing up now as shared matches are definitely not going to show up as shared matches after the change because they’re going to drop to a lower fifth to distant cousin category.

5. If you have time, energy and interest, screen capture as many of the shared match lists for other folks without Shared Ancestor Hints at the fourth cousin level as you can.

And whatever you do, don’t delay. This change is coming fast — it could be within days. It won’t be more than a week or 10 days away, and it could be as soon as tomorrow or the next day.

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35 Comments

Sharon C Connor on April 19, 2016 at 12:27 pm

Thanks, Judy, for giving more details on this. Roberta, bless her, sent us the “quick and dirty” piece, and I promptly followed her instructions. I wanted to know a little more, but didn’t waste any time trying to find out. I just did it. And now, as a reward for not wasting time on the “why” of it, our Judy gives us “the rest of the story.” Thank you both. And now I will go to BB’s blog. Sharon

It will result in changes to the total shared cM numbers, but most will go up in terms of total amount of DNA shared (since a 10 cM segment will be counted as 10 cM and not as whatever the “window” size was) and possibly down in terms of numbers of segments (for the same reason — only segments will be counted and not those “window” units).

I’ll be curious to see whether these new results will more closely match what gedmatch has for my A-kit matches there. It’s oddly hard to find gedmatch A-kit matches on ancestry; the CMs are off (although I am happy to see CMs at all).

I have just one ancestor hint and no circles or NADs; maybe this will be good?

I don’t think you’ll gain many circles or NADs, and the ancestor hints require others to have folks in their online trees who match folks in your online trees. But the total cM should be much closer on Gedmatch and Ancestry after this change.

I bought the Ancestry DNA kit at WDYTYA NEC earlier this month, took the test soon after and sent it off, receipt confirmed by Ancestry only four days ago. Can I assume my sample will be tested under the new rules ? and the new criteria is there to ensure more accurate results ?

My wife and I bought the kit and we weren’t happy with our DNA results because they stated we were about 71% Asia East. That means we can be Russian, Japanese, Korean, Chinese, etc. Will they do a retest for everyone? This whole thing was a waste of time and saliva.

I’m afraid that you got what you paid for. The problem is, you didn’t understand what it was you were buying. Autosomal DNA tests are never going to give you 100% surety about exactly what country your ancestors came from — DNA doesn’t work that way. What it’s really valuable for is helping you connect to cousins to research your shared heritage.

Bonnie on April 19, 2016 at 6:48 pm

Spent last night starring all those 4th cousins! Had just received results on one person and there must have been 250! I guesss that’s a good thing, but I’d rather spend my time on BSOs at midnight than clicking…On to screen shots! The only positive that I can see is that it forced me to review Quickly! And Poo to all those with DNA results and no family tree.

Went through and did most of the suggestions. Made sure that those in my circles were starred. May be this will straighten up some of my crazy matches were the highlighted circle person is not related but found other matches in the circle.

The DNAGedcom Client is a very useful tool for downloading all your AncestryDNA matches. You get all the data on shared cMs and shared segments in a spreadsheet along with the shared ancestor hints if you have any (I only have one). You also get a spreadsheet with your “in common with” matches. There is a very small fee to pay but it is well worth it. I wrote about my experiences of using the DNAGedcom Client here and have included a few screenshots:

Also and importantly you can download all your matches who have shared their Ancestry results with you. So don’t only DL your individual matches, ICW and Tree with the Client but also all your shared matches kits as well.

After that is done be sure to save those results in a separate folder or rename the files because DNA Gedcom overwrites the files in the cache and in the directory you have specified as your saved location. This way you have a data set baseline for comparing the changes, old to new, and will be able to import to excel/open office calc or other spreadsheet for easy look up and comparison.

I have a hopefully simple question…do you mean if I go in to the 4th cousins or later and click on the ‘star’ that will be what I need to do to be able to still search on them?! I have always made copies of my DNA Discoveries and DNA Circles, since there have been times that they seem to disappear. I just want to make sure that I have the right process down for the 4th cousins and beyond. I have a ton and don’t want to waste my time doing it wrong! Thanks for the information and for taking the time to answer my question!

If you star them, then even after the change, (a) if these are no longer matches at any level, you will be able to download information about them (how and in what form hasn’t been disclosed) and (b) if they are still matches but not at the 4th cousin level, you will be able to see them by bringing up your starred list.

Thank you Judy…that’s the way I understood it, but just wanted to make certain!!! Didn’t want to start out and then find out I was mistaken! Thank you for your prompt attention to my question! Don’t have to guess what my evening will be spent doing! Have a wonderful evening!

Judy G. Russell on April 21, 2016 at 6:35 pm

Glad to help.

Annie B on April 27, 2016 at 4:31 pm

Thanks for this heads up!!

Instead of screen shots, I’m doing google spreadsheets. I’ve got Circles with the ancestors we’re related to, links back to their pages and family trees as well as to any shared matches we have that might disappear.

I have also starred and made notes on every one I want to save, but I’ve got spreadsheets for them, too, on google with links to their family trees.

Thank you!!!! As soon as I read this article, I got busy. It took me two days to get everything starred and many screen shots saved! You never know where that one elusive clue might be, I sure didn’t want to lose it. Thank you so much for informing us and impressing us of the urgency of doing this!!

Judy, My matches and my fathers matches were changed in April. I came back from vacation April 29th, to find the new updated match list, dna circles, and “ancestry discoveries” and it has continued to change since then. I wondered if you know what is going on with “ancestry discoveries”. My dad has always had about 10 of them, none were truly his ancestors but several were kin, like maybe a ggg uncles son. Now dad has 22 and I can see no way he is related to the new people and what I find odd is all of them show that these families moved to Utah around Salt Lake City. So, I looked at my new ones, as well as three distant family members (from different families of my dad) and they are all showing about double the amount they had before and all with people who ended up in Utah. Something is not right with that.

As far as the other goes, I don’t understand how it is working. My dad and I lost the circle to his 3rd great grandfather. He has all the same matches to that family, they didn’t disappear. The circle lost half the members. In a different circle, we retained a 4th great grandfather but lost the circle to the 4th great grandmother! Only one family retained the 4th great grandmother circle. It makes no sense to me.

Hi. Can anyone answer this please. If my sister took this test and I also did could it be possible that say her results show a Scandinavian hit while mine might not? Is it also possible that one might show more % in Scandinavian than the other sister if we both show it? THANK YOU!, ☺

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